The Eastern Woman

The escape

Goneril was thrown without too many compliments in one of the underground cells.

The jailer Elf closed the door with a firm gesture, and with two turns of the key he clicked the lock.

The woman felt a rush of anger run down her back. She grabbed the bars with both hands. "Thranduil !! You can't do this! Damn you! You're infamous !!!" She shouted.

"Silence!" the guard commanded. "You'd better calm down. You will go crazy in this narrow space, if you don't save your energy."

"Give me those keys!" she cried, passing an arm through the iron bars. The Elf stepped back, also because the woman seemed furious, like a lioness in a cage. "Give me those keys ... and maybe I'll leave you alive!" she said.

The Elf laughed. "Lord Thranduil has not sentenced you to death, we are in charge of watching over you and bringing you food. I think he still needs to talk to you, so he wants you to survive."

"Your King is sentenced to death, I guarantee. Like all of you." she answered. "Your world will burn. Every single tree in this forest will be destroyed by flames. Fools!"

"Well ... while I'm waiting to burn ... I'm going to drink a glass. You ... make yourself comfortable." the guard chuckled. Then, after having hooked the bunch of keys to his belt, he left for the cellars.

"Come back here, move!" she shouted again.

"I wish you good night, mortal." the Elf replied as he walked away. And then he laughed again.

Goneril slammed a hand against the iron of that door. Locked. She was a prisoner. And, at that point, she could say farewell to her gold.

Of course, her men would gallop to Rivendell to steal the hundred boxes of coins. Unless Degarre had really chosen to join the rest of the peoples of the East and go to Gondor. To serve Sauron.

The more she thought about it, the more incredible it seemed. And suddenly, it was also clear to her why the Elves always had that indestructible superiority complex towards Men.
An Elf would never have joined the ranks of the Orcs. He would have rather killed himself, but he would never have chosen to serve Morgoth nor his friend Sauron.

But Men... Men were weak, ambitious, petty.  The Men of the East were ready to go to war against their brothers in the South, that was, the people of Gondor, and those of the West, Théoden and his people, to get Power.

She thought that even the race of Orcs was better than the human one: the Orcs didn't rob each other. There were no wars among them.  Yes, they all sided with Evil, but at least they were all siding with the same force. They were coherent.

She wasn't surprised by the Haradrims: they were descendants of the Black Numenoreans, the people who had chosen Melkor, or Morgoth, as their master millennia before.

The Corsairs of Umbar had been a thorn in the side for Gondor since the Second Age, and they certainly would not have missed the delicious opportunity to attempt the final assault on the great kingdom.

But from the Easterlings, especially from the Varyag of the Khand, she wouldn't have expected it.  The Khand was a small territory annexed to Mordor, but despite its geographical position, its inhabitants had always maintained a certain independence from the monsters that lived in Barad-dûr.

Indeed, they hated the Orcs.
Why did they suddenly submit to Sauron?  Why had they given up their autonomy?

Goneril found herself thinking back to Degarre's words: a power too great.  Yes, if the Dark Lord had won, the power he would have acquired would have been immense.  Irresistible.
The key was the Ring, which Gandalf had told her about.  That unknown Hobbit who was bearing it, was carrying a huge weight on his small shoulders.